Easter is good news. And it is also big business. According to John S. Kiernan, WalletHub Managing Editor in an article published on March 26, 2024, 3.1 billion dollars was projected to be spent on candy in 2024. 22 billion dollars was the total Easter-related spending expected in 2024. This works out to be $177 per person celebrating.
Although there are lots of people celebrating Easter as a cultural event – complete with chocolate eggs, chocolate bunnies, jelly beans, and Easter baskets, how many miss the true significance of it? Easter is the celebration of God’s raising of the crucified Jesus from the dead. The resurrection of Jesus is a cardinal doctrine in Christianity. The fact that we serve a risen Savior is a claim that sets Christianity apart from other religions.
“The story of God’s self-sacrifice...is the story with a cross at its center but not at its end: its plot moves toward the upsetting of all things, the Great Reversal in which the dead Jesus was raised from the tomb, and along with him our hope that death be swallowed up by life eternal.”
Those words by Donald McCullough in The Wisdom of Pelicans remind us once again as we approach Easter, that it was the great reversal. One might dare to even characterize it as “The World’s Greatest Upset.” Certainly, Satan and his host experienced it as such.
Easter is a yearly reminder that God’s plans cannot be thwarted. What he wills he will accomplish. Despite all the contraindications we may perceive, God’s work gets completed. And we should be reminded of God’s resurrection power, not just annually at Easter, but weekly, “on the first day of the week.” Every Sunday when we gather for worship, we gather because of the accomplishment of the Great Reversal, that those who were formerly sinners, alienated from God, now can come as a child of God because of the saving work of the risen Jesus Christ.
The resurrection of our Lord Jesus is our hope for our participation in a great reversal against the sickness, decay and death in this present world. The Apostle Peter writes: Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade--kept in heaven for you, (1 Peter 1:3-4 NIV).
Trust the resurrected Jesus for your own reversal from a way of life that leads to death to one which leads to eternal life. We can live without chocolate bunnies, chocolate eggs, jelly beans, and Easter bonnets, but we can’t really live without the resurrection of Jesus.
